Getting adult children to be responsible for themselves in all areas of life is often hindered by well-meaning parents who want to “help” their children become independent or, “get back on their feet”, but instead come to realize later on that the help provided never seems to end.
Adult children continue to make poor choices and bad decisions regarding how they spend their money, or live their lives then expect mom and dad to pick up the tab and continuously rescue them from experiencing the consequences of their choices and behaviors, wrongly thinking their parents are a 24-hour bank or ATM machine.
Enabling Adult Children
Adult children, some married with children of their own, are moving back home with their parents at an alarming rate, and shortly thereafter parents become frustrated when boundaries and rules are repeatedly broken, and requests for more money requires parents to dig deep into their life savings and retirement plans to the point where parents have gone broke helping their children.
Enabling occurs even when children are not living with the parents, with adult children and spouse working full-time jobs continuing to make regular phone calls to parents asking for money to pay utility bills because “It’s going to get shut off!”, or saying their “car is going to be repossessed” or the old standby, “We have no food in the house!”. My response would be, “I’m sorry to hear that but I can’t help you this time, and I have full trust and confidence that you will find a solution to the problem, and do what is necessary to make sure it doesn’t happen again”. Real NEED creates REAL motivation for change.
Not being an enabler myself, my message to parents is, “Just say no! Don’t give them anymore money and by all means, Kick them out of the house and change the locks!” I’ve heard from many parents who tell me their adult children are constantly asking for money “to pay bills”, while these “adults” are spending their own money on manicures, pedicures, Botox treatments, new clothes, expensive cell phones, concerts and sporting events, spa day, girls night out, electronic gadgets and other luxuries, all while “there is no food in the house”.
Learn How To Let Go Of The Control
Enablers have to learn how to “let go” of their adult children, let go of the control and Co-Dependent tendencies that run rampant amongst enabling parents and their children, allowing their adultchildren to experience the consequences that go with making choices on their own.
Continuously rescuing adult children, paying their bills, giving them money, allowing them to live at home with the parents, shielding them from the realities of how the real world works has created an Entitlement society. Today’s society of teenagers and adult children have come to believe their parents “owe” them whatever their hearts desire, and if parents don’t put a stop to it and close the bank of mom and dad, the problems of entitlement are only going to get worse. It doesn't mean you don't love or support your child, it means that you believe that they are capable of doing it on there own. No matter what their childhood was like or what kind of parent you were or they accuse you of being. Those are guilt trips and irresponsible excuses. You have ZERO reason to feel guilty. Fact is, they are adults and its no longer your responsibility to carry them. PERIOD!
When your adult children ask you for money tell them, “I’m sorry but I can’t help you this time, but I WILL pray for you”. The next time they ask, repeat the same sentence. Do not give your adult children any more money! Able-bodied children, working or not, can and need to learn how to manage their own lives, and that cannot be accomplished as long as children know that parents are their personal “back up plan”. Do they call you if they aren't short on rent, kids need school clothes etc? Do they ever call you and not actually ask you for something? As painful as that is. ..I didn't think so. As long as we continue to keep enabling our adult children, they will continue to deny they have any problems, and actually take responsibility since most of their problems are being “solved” by those around him. Only when our adult children are forced to face the consequences of their own actions—their ownchoices—will it finally begin to sink in how deep their patterns of dependence and avoidance have become. And only then will we as parents be able to take the next step to real healing, forever ending our enabling habits and behaviors. Like I said before, no matter what's happened in the past what kind of parent you were, active, absent, drunk or sober etc it's NOT your responsibility to take care of your adult children. It is theirs. Parents offer advice, prayer guidance NOT financial support to adult children. After all, why would your children make the grownup decision to get smart with their money, their lives when they know they can spend their own money frivolously on their extensive “want” list, knowing you will give them a handout time after time? Stop it and stop it now, before you find yourselves penniless in your elderly years with no financial means to take care of yourself.
How To Stop Enabling Adult Children
Children know what buttons to push with parents, especially when there are grandchildren being used as an excuse to get money from parents and grandparents, making it vitally important to learn how to stop enabling irresponsible adult children.
If your children have jobs of their own, no one is going to starve to death, and while their electric might be turned off due to bad choices, allowing them to experience the consequences of their own decisions really is helping them more than you may realize.
As long as we continue to keep enabling our adult children, they will continue to deny they have any problems, since most of their problems are being “solved” by those around them. Only when our adult children are forced to face the consequences of their own actions—their ownchoices—will it finally begin to sink in how deep their patterns of dependence and avoidance have become. And only then will we as parents be able to take the next step to real healing, forever ending our enabling habits and behaviors.
It's time to tell those adult children I love you. I care about you but I will not enable you. GROW UP!
